“She learned it where she still learns it: in the waterfalls where girls who have died for love weep, and on the lakes where the men of past times return.”
“She is still able to walk, then?”
“She is not old; she is only fifty.”
“But I thought she was infirm?”
“She can walk quicker and farther than you.”
“Then she is ill just at present, since she remained in bed while we were at breakfast?”
“She is not ill. She is often tired like that, when she has been standing up a long time.”
“I thought she did not work?”
“She does not work; she talks, or she walks; she sings, or she prays; and, whether by night or day, she watches until she drops with fatigue. Then she sleeps so long, that you would think she was dead; but sometimes you are very much surprised, in the morning, when you go to her bed, to find that she is neither there, nor in the house, nor on the mountains, nor anywhere, where any one else can go.”
“And where do you suppose she is, when she disappears in this way?”